Workers at City Market, Burlington’s grocery co-op, are demanding restoration of their hazard pay, after losing the bonus at the beginning of January.
Last week, more than 200 co-op employees signed a petition for a $5-an-hour wage increase. The bonus is intended to be compensation for the risks of essential work in a pandemic — risks that workers say have grown with Vermont’s elevated Covid numbers.
“There has never been a more dangerous time to work at the co-op,” the petition reads. “We call on management to fairly compensate us until all workers are able to receive their second dose of the vaccine.”
Fears have run particularly high at the co-op recently, workers say. In the past two weeks, two City Market employees have tested positive for Covid, sending several others into quarantine.
The two cases, one at the co-op’s downtown store and one at its South End location, were not connected, according to a person with knowledge of the situation but who was not authorized to discuss it. But fears of potential on-the-job exposure amplified workers’ calls for additional compensation.
City Market workers first petitioned for hazard pay last March, in the very first weeks of the pandemic. They were successful: For more than three months, full-time workers received an additional $120 per week.
Management cut the extra pay, which it called an “appreciation bonus,” to $75 per week in the summer, and again reduced the bonus to $50 per week in November after another set of negotiations. On Jan. 2, workers lost the hazard pay entirely.
“We’re in the biggest spike in cases in Vermont in the entire pandemic,” said Alex Smith, a leader of the co-op employees union. “Three times what it was back in April, when we first petitioned for hazard pay. And we’re getting nothing.”
Reached by email, Mae Quilty, the co-op’s community engagement director, said the hazard pay was “not sustainable for the co-op to continue during a time of unprofitability and unpredictable sales trends.”
She declined to comment specifically on the petition, as management has yet to respond formally to the demands.
“From the start, both teams recognized that this would not be a permanent benefit,” she said, adding that the co-op had invested nearly $700,000 in the wage increase.
City Market showed a slight increase in sales for June 2019 to June 2020 period, according to its annual report.
Still, the co-op has been in debt since opening a new location in the South End in 2017, and Quilty said its downtown store has had a steep decline in sales during the pandemic. She conceded that was “not the case” for the South End store, but said, “The economic effects of the pandemic on the overall financial health and performance of the co-op have been significant.”
Without hazard pay, about 70% of co-op employees make less than $15 an hour, according to figures provided by the union.
Covid scares
The recent Covid cases, and management’s response, have caused concern among some City Market employees.
“There’s a lot of anxiety,” said one worker at the downtown store, who asked not to be named.
One of the employees who tested positive received notice of the result while at work. People deemed close contacts to that individual were informed and told to quarantine, in accordance with CDC guidelines.
The rest of the staff, however, was not notified of the case for five days.
“While the risk of exposure is limited to individuals who qualify as close contacts, we understand the importance of sharing the information more broadly with our staff,” Quilty said of the incident, while noting that the delay did not violate Vermont’s health standards.
Quilty said the co-op would commit to share that information in the future. When another worker tested positive, on Feb. 5, the co-op announced it publicly that same day.
After the first case, some took to social media to express their worries. A flood of anonymous testimonials, apparently from City Market employees, caused a buzz on Instagram last week, after a page prompted workers to share their stories.
“We do not feel like it is OK for us to call out, even if we feel sick, due to understaffing,” one read. Another said: “I’m scared to be working here right now but I’m nervous that if I call out they’ll fire me.”
Yet another: “No one is being told anything; it’s just whispers.”
The downtown store worker told VTDigger they could corroborate some of the complaints. “A lot of people felt like management and upper management weren’t looking out for them,” the worker said.
That person, too, described a fellow worker who “desperately wants to call out, but can’t afford to.”
“Workers having to say to our manager, ‘Hey, I’m sick. I’m going to stay home.’ The reality is that’s a hard conversation,” said John Donoghue, president of City Market’s union. He hopes to “empower workers to know that they have that permission.” And part of that, he said, was additional sick time — another demand included in the petition.
Co-op management told VTDigger it intends to respond to the petition this week. If management declines to restore hazard pay, Smith said the union will bring the campaign to the public, joining the ranks of grocery workers nationally who are demanding higher pay.
“I think we’re going to have to ask the community to hold City Market accountable,” she said.
